The web development company uses Dropbox Business to improve collaboration on things like health forms and all-hand presentations – and developers can keep working even when they're on the road.

Mobify's key results

Enhanced administrative visibility and control

Easy onboarding and widespread user adoption

Collaboration from anywhere, on any device

THE CHALLENGE

Trial and error

With a staff of great technical minds under its roof, Mobify has always operated without a formal IT department. Instead, it finds great products that can be used without requiring much support. Some applications – such as Dropbox – became fixtures due to widespread employee usage.
Although Dropbox Basic and Pro accounts were popular among employees, they created a logistical challenge. In an effort to establish more centralised corporate file management and better control of file access, the company moved to another solution similar to Dropbox. Unfortunately, this move created a nightmare. System Engineer Kyle Young remembers “We heard complaints that documents weren’t being synced and some were being deleted. No one could find their way around.”
The company decided it just didn’t make sense to pay for a solution that wasn’t working. After discovering that Dropbox Business met all of its requirements for security and corporate control, Mobify were elated and quickly moved back. “Everyone remembered how seamless sharing and syncing was with Dropbox” Young says. “There were no lost files, and that was exactly what the users wanted. The enterprise solution also met all of our criteria. Anyone who works in technology has a higher standard for the tools they use, and Dropbox Business really is the only one that meets it as far as a file-sharing solution goes.”
Within each office, teams were initially supplied with NAS storage servers and VPN access to files. But VPN connections quickly proved problematic. As Global IT Services Manager Nithin Veeraarasu describes, “Remote access was an ongoing issue, especially for our sales team. They would try to pull information across the VPN using 3G hotspots, which wasn’t ideal. We started running into so many problems trying to sync documents and keep versions straight.”
On top of connectivity and versioning challenges, Mac users – who account for 35 per cent of the workforce – were encountering OS conflicts when trying to use the VPN. The mounting issues were complicating the expansion process and demanding an inordinate amount of time and energy from NewVoiceMedia’s IT team.

“Anyone who works in technology has a higher standard for the tools they use, and Dropbox Business really is the only one that meets it as far as a file-sharing solution goes”

Kyle Young, System Engineer, Mobify

THE SOLUTION

Fast, easy adoption

It only took a week to onboard Mobify’s entire 85-person staff to Dropbox Business. Because users already knew and loved Dropbox, setup was simple and the grievances that had been rife with the previous solution stopped immediately. Young describes Dropbox Business as “very intuitive”, adding “What matters to us is team productivity and velocity. We always want to focus on our key strength, which is our core business value, not managing IT. Dropbox Business helps us do that.”
Dropbox Business lets Mobify take back control of company documents, keeping a clear line between work and personal files while still allowing employees to access their personal Dropbox accounts. Syncing incidents that took place with the previous solution, such as the disappearance of a sales contract template right in the middle of a negotiation, are a distant memory. According to Young, “I used to have to troubleshoot for a few hours every week. Onboarding, offboarding and setting up permissions with our old solution seemed very Byzantine compared with Dropbox Business.”
Now Young can let content owners manage their own file permissions while he focuses on system and product development priorities. As an eager adopter of Dropbox Business himself, Young explains that “At Mobify, we prefer solutions like Dropbox Business that don’t require us to manage them. The time we get back can be turned around and invested directly into our product.”

“At Mobify, we prefer solutions like Dropbox Business that don’t require us to manage them. The time we get back can be turned around and invested directly into our product.”

Kyle Young, System Engineer, Mobify

THE RESULTS

Conquering collaboration

Mobify makes all company-wide assets – such as health benefit documents and slides from weekly all-hands meetings – available in Dropbox Business, but individual departments also use Dropbox Business to create smaller sharing circles. For example, product development designers share files with marketing designers so they can be plugged into promotional materials. “Dropbox Business has been great for facilitating a kind of ‘guild’ mentality, where designers in different silos can easily cross-communicate and collaborate” Young explains.
When it comes to external collaboration, Dropbox Business shared links provide a simple way for Mobify to send materials to their marketing partner in Seattle, and let the Special Services team share product development mock-ups with clients. “Dropbox Business is fundamental to our timely sharing of up-to-date assets” says Content Marketing Strategist David Fay.
When Mobify employees have to travel, Dropbox Business features, including reliable sync, offline access and an intuitive mobile app, help them stay connected and productive. As Fay explains, “We’ll be on a plane or in a hotel room and very quickly have to put an asset together. With Dropbox Business, everything is there, in order, when we need it, and that enables us to very quickly create materials and keep work moving forwards.”
Whether Mobify employees are in the throes of production or on the road pitching new clients, they can count on Dropbox Business. The ease and dependability it provides are exactly why Mobify chose it in the beginning – and in the end.